Objective:

This was a "Get what you get" kind of project. It started off with taking a random subject matter, in this case "a thief" and taking an equally random setting also in this case "in a castle" which sounds almost too perfect to be random but it was. 

My initial thoughts for this project was to create the narrative of a young thief putting his skills and special cloak to the test as he sneaks through the castle to get to the infamous treasure room inside, gambling his life for as much gold as he can carry. And a point of interest I wanted to expand upon was a question of whether he would be caught or not. So creating a sense of tension was one that I wanted to explore with this. Whether that be with the thief being chased by guards over ramparts, or with him in front of broken windows, stuffing pockets and bags.

After going through some different Ideas like a really dark and close foreground shot of the thief in front of a set of doors with the treasure room and guards inside, maybe a lighthearted sarcastic thief that jumps from the ramparts away from the guards with his gold and catches a rope to swing away on. But I settled on the Idea of a first person view of the thief looking into the treasure room.

For my final idea I wanted to expand on the first person point of view. I wanted to add some subtle tells to how the thief was getting into the room with a broken lock on the door or a lockpick in his hands as he pushes the doors open. I still wanted to try and add some tension and put a patrolling guard in the background walking along the catwalk, while still having focus and emphasis on the sheer amount of gold and treasure in the room.

I started off with simple line and fills for the doors and added a lock bar to it. and I also drew out basic hand shapes to make it look like someone had already opened the door and is watching the inside. I used basic fill for the inside to give a basic outline for the room. 

I then added a simple carpet walkup to a pedestal or stairs to give the impression that there was something very precious and important inside this room.

next was adding the carpet up the stairs to the chest and I started adding the gold that would be littering the roomI also added the catwalk for the guard to walk along. 

the final base image was the rest of the treasure piles and adding some minor details. 

This image turned out to be the final and ended up being more of an abandoned or empty room given how dark and empty it is besides the treasures. I think it is still fitting for a thief in a castle as the darkness of the room makes it feel like its the dead of night and the Thief snuck in when there were no guards present. 

This was definitely a fun project and I learned how to use the pen and fill tools more efficiently as well as a better understanding of how to use not only the base layers but the layers of the groups within those layers for details and fitting everything together. I could have used more time to work on even more details like shadows, wrinkles and creases on the hands, lines and detailing for the wood doors and chest, and a guard in the background would have made this project feel a lot better.